Which of these 90s British Politics TLs should I do?

Inspired by the various 2010 GE timelines and particularly Maskedpickle's President Perot TL I'm planning my first properly written timeline. It will be a wide-ranged butterfly timeline dealing with a wide stage following the initial PoD. At least inspired by and possibly completely Shamelessly ripping off Maskedpickle in style and approach :D :p

All my ideas centre around the 1997 General Election and events leading up to it.

My Ideas are as follows.

1) What ever happened to The Prince of Darkness: Peter Mandelson isn't selected by Neil Kinnock to work for the Labour party as director of communications. Thus he is never involved in the Labour electionof 1987 and doesnt bcome an MP in 1990. It'd track a moderately changed Labour party without the influence of Mandelson and his labelling as the first "Spin Doctor". Particularly leading up to 1997 but the (probable) Labour government following this.

2) The Man who would be Grin: Towards the beginning of the 1997 Election. Tony Blair is killed in a Car Crash. The TL would folllow Labour through a General election with John Prescott suddenly having the lead the party and subequent premiership or leadership competition (possibly leading to Gordon Brown as Prime Minister from 1997)

3) Same as 2 but Blair is killed just before the Labour Leadership vote in 1994.

4) The Best of enemies : Owing to a bad case of food poisoning either Tony Blair or Gordon Brown postpones their meeting at the Granita restaurant. They eventually cancel the meeting and Goron Brown goes into the leadership election against Blair in 1994,

5) A Brighter shade of Blue: Britain never enters the ERM and so never suffers Black Wednesday. This follows a more popular Major premiership and 1997 election.

Opinions and preference please!!

6) As 5) but Britain stays in the ERM at least until after 1997.

EDIT: The damn poll didnt work. Oh well!
 
Best Of Enemies sounds interesting but in all probability wouldn't be too meaty after all. Blair would simply beat Brown and there'd be no brooding or 'I owe him' element that kept Gordon in Number 11 for so long. It would be an economics TL rather than a fun, mudslinging politics one.

The Mandy one on the other hand sounds great. An original PoD and one that could make for fascinating butterflies.

Blair dying before the 1994 election is also interesting, as a Brown 1997 government is then inevitable. However, feel free to nick this particularly gruesome PoDI came up with as it offers something slightly different.

I don't know enough about the ERM to know what butterflies would ensure from not joining it, but I don't imagine it would be a black and white 'if we weren't in it, everything is fine for Major' scenario.
 

Thande

Donor
Are you planning to go back to that Granita one Meadow, I always found it rather interesting.
 
Blair dying before the 1994 election is also interesting, as a Brown 1997 government is then inevitable. However, feel free to nick this particularly gruesome PoDI came up with as it offers something slightly different.

I don't know enough about the ERM to know what butterflies would ensure from not joining it, but I don't imagine it would be a black and white 'if we weren't in it, everything is fine for Major' scenario.

I may yet nick that PoD <bwahahahaha> It looks interesting </bwahahaha> I'll see what other comments come up.

My first impression would be that people would be more likely to notice the Tories bringing Britain out of a minor recession and they wouldnt be "damned from the start" as they seemed to be in OTL. I doubt it'd butterfly away the country being tired of the tories. So I'd say a small Lab majority or Lab-Lib Dem Coallition.
 
1) What ever happened to The Prince of Darkness: Peter Mandelson isn't selected by Neil Kinnock to work for the Labour party as director of communications. Thus he is never involved in the Labour electionof 1987 and doesnt bcome an MP in 1990. It'd track a moderately changed Labour party without the influence of Mandelson and his labelling as the first "Spin Doctor". Particularly leading up to 1997 but the (probable) Labour government following this.

2) The Man who would be Grin: Towards the beginning of the 1997 Election. Tony Blair is killed in a Car Crash. The TL would folllow Labour through a General election with John Prescott suddenly having the lead the party and subequent premiership or leadership competition (possibly leading to Gordon Brown as Prime Minister from 1997)

3) Same as 2 but Blair is killed just before the Labour Leadership vote in 1994.

4) The Best of enemies : Owing to a bad case of food poisoning either Tony Blair or Gordon Brown postpones their meeting at the Granita restaurant. They eventually cancel the meeting and Goron Brown goes into the leadership election against Blair in 1994,

5) A Brighter shade of Blue: Britain never enters the ERM and so never suffers Black Wednesday. This follows a more popular Major premiership and 1997 election.

Opinions and preference please!!

6) As 5) but Britain stays in the ERM at least until after 1997.

I like all the options, but I have several preferences.

Number 4 is interesting because it will lead to a reduced labour majority in 1997, and it might lead to a split in the party.

Number 1 is the one I am favoring because it leads to a more moderate labour party, but without Blair and Brown. Perhaps for this option, you can make Blair a Tory, like his father wanted him to be.

Number 3 might lead to a a labour victory in 1997, but that victory would be slim because of Tory fatigue. (Tory governments 1979-1997). I imagine a labour government for one term (5 years), and then being defeated
in 2002.

Number 5 is also my favorite because I myself am a eurosceptic, and I am in line with Thathcher's views on the EU. Taking this TL to the extreme would be a complete British withdrawl from the EU, but I don't think that will happen. Also without Blair, whom to lead the labourites is a good question.

So to sum up. 4 is interesting. 3 I like. 5 & 1 are my favorites. However the choice is yours.

Wishing you well, his majesty,
The Scandinavian Emperor
 
Are you planning to go back to that Granita one Meadow, I always found it rather interesting.

I'd love to but I simply don't have the time this year to really put the research in. It's something that deeply fascinates me, too, but if I were to attempt it I know it would probably just be a 'Robin Cook takes over, wins everything, governs like a competent Tony Benn'-wank. I do know an expert on Labour Leadership elections (he's literally written the book on them) so I might send him a polite email asking if he could come up with any thoughts on the matter. If Kingclumsy attempts it I'll send them over to him, if not I'll make it a public post.
 
I'd love to but I simply don't have the time this year to really put the research in. It's something that deeply fascinates me, too, but if I were to attempt it I know it would probably just be a 'Robin Cook takes over, wins everything, governs like a competent Tony Benn'-wank. I do know an expert on Labour Leadership elections (he's literally written the book on them) so I might send him a polite email asking if he could come up with any thoughts on the matter. If Kingclumsy attempts it I'll send them over to him, if not I'll make it a public post.

Thanks very much. Would it be ok to pester you occaisionally with regards to writing and choices (like i said this is my first properly planned, non-ASB TL) particularly if I did the Granita TL.

I like all the options, but I have several preferences.

Number 1 is the one I am favoring because it leads to a more moderate labour party, but without Blair and Brown. Perhaps for this option, you can make Blair a Tory, like his father wanted him to be.

It wouldn't unless he switched parties. the PoD would be 1985/86 by which time Blair was a Labour MP for 2-3 years.

Number 5 is also my favorite because I myself am a eurosceptic, and I am in line with Thathcher's views on the EU. Taking this TL to the extreme would be a complete British withdrawl from the EU, but I don't think that will happen. Also without Blair, whom to lead the labourites is a good question.

Much less so if Labour made an alliance or coallition with the Lib Dems, who are on the whole pro-EU. It could lead to a much more euroskeptic Tory party and possibly butterfly away the creation of UKIP (or at least their successes to date). Alternatively it might lead to a less Euroskeptic Tory party as they havent been soured/put off europe so could lead to a stronger UKIP.

I just don't know.
 
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One interesting TL might be a continued Referendum Party, maybe have the founder survive about five more years and we might have a radically altered political landscape.
 

Thande

Donor
One interesting TL might be a continued Referendum Party, maybe have the founder survive about five more years and we might have a radically altered political landscape.

Yeah, I hadn't realised how well the Referendum Party did (other political stories were masked by Labour's landslide--look at how the Lib Dems' massive breakthrough slipped under many people's radar). It's taken UKIP years to match the Referendum Party's 1997 share of the Popular vote. To see what I mean, here's a map of the 1997 election I made for an ASB thread if it had been held under "Fourth past the post"--i.e. you eliminate the top three results in each constituency. This reveals popular support for the main non-big-three parties. For 2010 the map was quite diverse, with UKIP, the BNP and the Greens all being big parties in such an ASB parliament, but in 1997 it would have been a Referendum wipeout.

1997 election decapitated.png
 
One does wonder what may have happened if they stayed active.

Would they have gotten larger or smaller? What difference may have been made? All that interesting stuff.
 
One does wonder what may have happened if they stayed active.

Would they have gotten larger or smaller? What difference may have been made? All that interesting stuff.

Its definitely possible.

My TL won't be 100% accurate and as realistic as possible (not on the same level as say, Stodge or Meadow). (when I get around to writing it...)
 
I think I'll go with Option 1. A TL based on Meadows Idea of "the Granita Explosion" is tempting but whenever I start to make notes it turns into a Lib Dem/ Voting reform Wank

the PoD is Mandelson declines Kinnocks offer to become Labour director of communications in 1985 and instead remains as a television producer.

Meadow. I may PM you in a bit with a few questions and perhaps ask for a second opinion.
 
5 & 6 are good ones. For No. 6 though, the best POD is prior to UK entry into the ERM, getting the pound down low enough so it isn't forced to withdraw. Without that, UK can stay in and we'll see what happens after that - besides a possibly better Tory vote in '97 of course, that much is almost a given.
 
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